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While most wish the rain would go away after a soggy, flood-filled weather season, there are pluses — namely huge gains in water to help with the pesky drought that has been hanging around for half the decade. One of the most impressive gains of the season happened late last year, when NOAA found that Lake Tahoe added 8,690,131,707 gallons of fresh water between Dec. 9 and 11. If you’re trying to picture just how much water that is, here’s a handy fact: it’s the same amount as filling 13,158 Olympic-sized swimming pools, Forbes reported.

Combining $3 million each from the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) and the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) have made possible a $6 million pilot grant program for joint applications involving funding for both agricultural water suppliers and agricultural operations.  The grant funding provided in this joint program is intended to address multiple goals including: 1) water use efficiency, conservation and reduction, 2) greenhouse gas emission reductions, 3) groundwater protection, and 4) sustainability of agricultural operations and food production.

Cindy Messer, a former deputy director of the Delta Stewardship Council, has been appointed chief deputy director at the California Department of Water Resource where she has served as assistant chief deputy director since 2016, Gov. Jerry Brown’s Office announced Tuesday. Messer, of Sacramento, was deputy director of the Planning, Performance and Technology Division at the Delta Stewardship Council from 2012 to 2016 and assistant executive officer at the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Conservancy from 2010 to 2012.

For the first time in four years, more than half of California’s land area is no longer classified as being in drought conditions by the federal government — the latest milestone signaling the end of the state’s historic drought. Altogether, 53 percent of California has seen enough precipitation, and its reservoirs and groundwater levels filled so much that it is not in drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, a weekly report issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the University of Nebraska. A year ago, just 5 percent of the state was out of drought.

With a break in the weather and increased outflow from Oroville Dam’s heavily damaged spillway, state officials said Friday morning they no longer believe the swollen reservoir will breach the dam’s emergency spillway. After a grim assessment late Thursday, officials announced Friday morning they think they can avoid using the dam’s emergency spillway, which they’ve been working feverishly to avoid. The emergency structure feeds into an unlined ravine, and the water would propel soil, trees and other debris into the Feather River.